OddballGreg - The Snowball Effect

Snowballs. Aren't these just the best? Especially when they roll down mountains and cause avalanches. That's also fun.

The snowball effect is a fairly well known effect in which small initial circumstances quickly grow into larger and potentially more voracious occurrence which can have a larger impact on whatever it affects. This effect can be taken in a great many ways, not limited to the literal, metaphorical or philosophical. Let's talk about that.

Snow. It's great fun to play in snow. Having lived in, (and never left), South Africa all my life, I have only seen snow twice. 2012 and 2013, both years of which, the South African weather took a turn for the abnormal and gave many, including myself, a taste of what winter is like in the northern hemisphere. Of course, what's more fun than snow, is snowballs. Especially since, apart from their very literal fun for throwing, are quite a fantastic source of the so called "Snowball Effect".

The snowball effect is so named after the phenomenon of rolling a snowball down a snowy hill or mountain. As snow tends to grip to itself, the rolling ball quickly gathers additional snow as it rolls, gaining in size and speed exponentially as a result as the growing surface area allows it to gather larger quantities of snow quicker, until it it veritably large enough to cause an avalanche, or at least cause significant impact upon collision.

Of course, humanity, being the keen minded people that we are, quickly decided that the snowball effect, or "snowballing" as it is called by many, was a very apt metaphor for all manner of things in life, ranging from the aeronautical effects of weight reductions or increases. (That is to say, a decrease in the weight of the aircraft would also allow a decrease in wingspan as less lift is required, which means smaller engines can be used. As such, the effective weight reduction is always greater than the initial projection as a result of the additional reductions. This works the same in the opposite as well.)

In not-so-technical applications, the snowball effect can be used to describe a great many interesting things ranging from the gold gathered from a well-played champion's kills making them proceedingly more difficult to kill in League Of Legends, to the way that a small increase in public spending can create more educated masses, which can increase GDP, which again allows for increases in public spending, and so on and so forth.

Philosophically speaking, this is comparable to all kinds of things that affect the way a person lives and leads their lives. Consider what people call "exploding in rage". The act of throwing a tantrum due to some offensive act. Usually, this is not a result of a single offensive act, but more the snowballing of anger and outrage as slight after slight is made against the person, until eventually, it takes one unfortunate individuals poorly positioned placement in front of the snowball to cause a rather tumultuous outburst, often to the detriment of all involved.

In any case, I'm sure you can place this interesting effect into all manner of metaphors in the human life, though for me to continue to do so would do little more good. If you have any interesting uses of the metaphor to share, or simply which to make a comment in general, do be sure to share it down in the comments below, or via Facebook/Twitter as we here at TCSA love to hear from you. Speaking of sharing, if you have any philosophically minded friends, do be sure to share this post with them as I am sure they will appreciate the thought. Of course, if you yourself would like to read more posts like these then do be sure to like the Official TCSA Facebook page and/or follow us on Twitter using the associated buttons on the bar to the left to read all the latest posts, as they're published. Regardless of what you do, I thank you for taking the time to read this post; hope that you have/had an absolutely FANTASTIC day, and I will speak again soon.

Safe travels my friends.